Caves and the passages of the underworld form a recurring symbol in the novel, representing the boundary between the known, rational world and the unknown realm of mystery and imagination. These subterranean spaces are both literal geological features of Vermont and metaphorical portals to a deeper, more magical reality. The book’s opening epigraphs immediately establish this symbolism, with one narrator describing a descent through caverns to find “a dazzling, vanished world” (3). This journey into the Earth is framed as a transformative experience, a stripping away of the surface world to reveal a hidden truth. The cave is where the central myth of Jeremiah Wylkes originates, and it’s the ultimate destination for the characters Searching for Meaning in the Modern World. It promises an alternative to the disappointments of the surface.

The narrative uses the family dog, Giuseppe, as an animal guide whose instinctual digging literally unearths these symbolic spaces. His compulsive excavations, first revealing the “Super-Rat-Line” and later the cave where Olive is lost (102), serve as a comedic but important bridge between the family’s domestic life and the region’s underlying mystery. The underworld that the Wylkesians seek is a product of